Cultural variations in allocare are vast. Each theory just described can be used to justify or criticize variations. No theory directly endorses any particular position. Nonetheless, theories are made to be useful, so we include some implications of various theories in our discussion.

It is estimated that about 134 million babies will be born each year from 2010 to 2021 (United Nations, 2013). Most newborns are cared for primarily or exclusively by their mothers; allocare increases as the baby gets older. Fathers and grandmothers typically provide care as well. Daily care by a non-relative, trained and paid to provide it, occurs for only about 15 percent of infants worldwide, a statistic that obscures the vast range from one culture to another.

For instance, virtually no infant in some of the poorest nations receives regular non-maternal care unless the mother is dead, and then a close relative takes over. By contrast, 90 percent of the infants of the wealthiest families within some developed nations are cared for regularly by a nanny or babysitter at home, a family day-care provider in her (almost never his) home, or a trained professional in a day-care center, where there are separate rooms for infants, toddlers, and so on.

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As discussed previously, fathers worldwide increasingly take part in baby care. However, some cultures still expect fathers to stay at a distance and others favor equality (Lamb, 2013).

Most nations provide some paid leave for mothers who are in the workforce. Some also provide paid leave for fathers, and several nations provide paid family leave that can be taken by either parent or shared between them. The length of paid leave varies from a few days to about 15 months (see Figure 7.3). Laws in many nations guarantee that a mother’s job will be open to her when her leave is over.

Some concern about job security and shared care arises from humanism, which values the well-being of every family member. As found by a group of family physicians, mothers are more likely to become depressed if they are sole caregivers without employment or outside support (Gjerdingen et al., 2014).

Since behaviorists emphasize learning, they seek to ensure that every baby has the proper experiences, whether provided by the mother or by someone else. One popular effort to ensure this is to send trained visitors to mothers of infants at home. They provide toys, books, and advice, encouraging caregiver–infant relationships—a practice that reduces child abuse and other physical and psychological problems (Olds, 2006).

There is no agreed-on best practice. As one review explained: “This evidence now indicates that early nonparental care environments sometimes pose risks to young children and sometimes confer benefits” (Phillips et al., 2011). The same can be said for parents: Some provide excellent care; some do not.

Many people believe that the practices of their own family or culture are best and that other patterns harm either the infant or the mother. This is another example of the difference-equals-deficit error. Without evidence, assumptions flourish. Some people advocate professional care for children of all ages; others disagree. For ideological as well a economic reasons, center-based infant care is common in France, Israel, China, Norway, and Sweden, where it is heavily subsidized by the governments and many families take it for granted as a valuable public right.

Center care is scarce in South Asia, Africa, and Latin America. Many parents believe it is harmful. (Table 7.3 lists five essential characteristics of high-quality infant day care, wherever it may be located.)

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Most nations are between those two extremes. One example comes from Australia, where the government has recently attempted to increase the birth rate. Parents are given $5,000 for each newborn, parental leave is paid, and public subsidies provide child-care centers. The law endorses the concept that young children benefit from interactions with other children, yet many Australians contend that babies need exclusive maternal care (Harrison et al., 2014). As you might imagine, each side claims support from psychological theory: sociocultural versus Freud.

Parents are caught in the middle. For example, one Australian mother of a 12-month-old boy chose center care, but said:

I spend a lot of time talking with them about his day and what he’s been doing and how he’s feeling and they just seem to have time to do that, to make the effort to communicate. Yeah they’ve really bonded with him and he’s got close to them. But I still don’t like leaving him there. And he doesn’t, to be honest…. Because he’s used to sort of having, you know, parents.

[quoted in Boyd et al., 2013]

Underlying every policy and practice are theories about what is best. In the United States, marked variations are apparent by state and by employer, with some employers far more generous than the law requires. Almost no company pays for paternal leave, with one exception: The U.S. military allows 10 days of paid leave for fathers.

In the United States, only 20 percent of infants are cared for exclusively by their mothers (i.e., no other relatives or babysitters) throughout their first year. This is in contrast to Canada, which is similar to the United States in ethnic diversity but has far more generous maternal leave and lower rates of maternal employment. In the first year of life, most Canadians are cared for only by their mothers (Babchishin et al., 2013). Obviously, these differences are affected by culture, economics, and politics more than by any universal needs of babies.

The home visiting programs that help some novice mothers do not always have the desired effects (Paulsell et al., 2014), and grandmother care, informal care, and center care have each sometimes been destructive. For example, in most nations and centuries, infants were more likely to survive if their grandmothers were nearby, especially when they were newly weaned (Sear & Mace, 2008). The hypothesis is that grandmothers provided essential nourishment and protection. But in one era (northern Germany, 1720–1874), living with a grandmother, especially a paternal grandmother, had a negative effect on infant survival (Beise & Voland, 2002).

Mixed evidence can also be found for center care, as the following A View from Science explains.

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No matter what form of care is chosen or what theory is endorsed, individualized care with stable caregivers seems best (Morrissey, 2009). Caregiver change is especially problematic for infants because each simple gesture or sound that a baby makes not only merits an encouraging response but also requires interpretation by someone who knows that particular baby well.

For example, “baba” could mean bottle, baby, blanket, banana, or some other word that does not even begin with b. This example is an easy one, but similar communication efforts—requiring individualized emotional responses, preferably from a familiar caregiver—are evident even in the first smiles and cries.

A related issue is the diversity of baby care providers. Especially when the home language is not the majority language, parents hesitate to let people of another linguistic background care for their infants. That is one reason that, in the United States, immigrant parents often prefer care by relatives instead of by professionals (Miller et al., 2014). Relationships are crucial, not only between caregiver and infant, but also between caregiver and parent (Elicker et al., 2014).

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Particularly problematic is instability of non-maternal care, as when an infant is cared for by a neighbor, a grandmother, a center, and then another grandmother, each for only a month or two. By age 3, children with unstable care histories are likely to be more aggressive than those with stable non-maternal care, such as being at the same center with the same caregiver for years (Pilarz & Hill, 2014).

As is true of many topics in child development, questions remain. But one fact is without question: Each infant needs personal responsiveness. Someone should serve as a partner in the synchrony duet, a base for secure attachment, and a social reference who encourages exploration. Then infant emotions and experiences—cries and laughter, fears and joys—will ensure that psychosocial development goes well.

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